Shell NotifyIcon Example 1
Introduction This is a simple example application of how to use icons in the Windows taskbar notification area. The code presented here is not an example of good coding practice, but is intended to demonstrate a concept. Error checking is left to the developer to implement. Putting an icon in the taskbar notification area does not automatically hide your application. You need to programmatically implement everything that you want your application to do. Showing/hiding the application is covered in other example applications and is not repeated in this one. Download the Source Code Download the source code for this example here: *Delphi 4 *Delphi 2005 Description To begin with, create a new VCL forms application. The next thing is to create an updated NotifyIconData structure, because the version that is included with Delphi 2005 and earlier has less functionality. Specifics about the structure are explained in the links in the references section of this article. There's little point in repeating them here, so do read them. Without further ado, create a new unit and call it something like "NotifyIcon" and make it look like the following: unit NotifyIcon; interface uses Windows, Messages; const {$EXTERNALSYM NIN_BALLOONSHOW} NIN_BALLOONSHOW = WM_USER + 2; {$EXTERNALSYM NIN_BALLOONHIDE} NIN_BALLOONHIDE = WM_USER + 3; {$EXTERNALSYM NIN_BALLOONTIMEOUT} NIN_BALLOONTIMEOUT = WM_USER + 4; {$EXTERNALSYM NIN_BALLOONUSERCLICK} NIN_BALLOONUSERCLICK = WM_USER + 5; {$EXTERNALSYM NIF_INFO} NIF_INFO = $00000010; {$EXTERNALSYM NIIF_NONE} NIIF_NONE = $00000000; {$EXTERNALSYM NIIF_INFO} NIIF_INFO = $00000001; {$EXTERNALSYM NIIF_WARNING} NIIF_WARNING = $00000002; {$EXTERNALSYM NIIF_ERROR} NIIF_ERROR = $00000003; {$EXTERNALSYM NIIF_USER} NIIF_USER = $00000004; {$EXTERNALSYM NIIF_ICON_MASK} NIIF_ICON_MASK = $0000000F; {$EXTERNALSYM NIIF_NOSOUND} NIIF_NOSOUND = $00000010; type PNotifyIconDataA = ^TNotifyIconDataA; PNotifyIconData = PNotifyIconDataA; {$EXTERNALSYM _NOTIFYICONDATAA} _NOTIFYICONDATAA = record cbSize: DWORD; Wnd: HWND; uID: UINT; uFlags: UINT; uCallbackMessage: UINT; hIcon: HICON; szTip: array 0..127 of AnsiChar; dwState: DWORD; dwStateMask: DWORD; szInfo: array 0..255 of AnsiChar; case Integer of 0: ( uTimeout: UINT; szInfoTitle : array 0..63 of AnsiChar; dwInfoFlags: DWORD; guidItem: TGUID); 1: ( uVersion: UINT); end; {$EXTERNALSYM _NOTIFYICONDATA} _NOTIFYICONDATA = _NOTIFYICONDATAA; TNotifyIconDataA = _NOTIFYICONDATAA; TNotifyIconData = TNotifyIconDataA; {$EXTERNALSYM NOTIFYICONDATAA} NOTIFYICONDATAA = _NOTIFYICONDATAA; {$EXTERNALSYM NOTIFYICONDATA} NOTIFYICONDATA = NOTIFYICONDATAA; implementation end. Add this unit to the uses clause in the interface section of your main form's unit. Add ShellAPI to the uses clause in the implementation section of your main form's unit. This unit contains some constants used by the example application. Add the following constant to your unit, the name is arbitrary and the value must be wm_User or greater: const wm_IconMessages = wm_User + 100; Add the following to the protected section of your main form's type definition: protected procedure wmIconMessages(var Msg: tMessage); message wm_IconMessages; The name of the procedure is arbitrary, but the convention is to use something similar to the message to which it responds. Note that we're using the message defined in the constants section. Add the following variables to the private section of your main form's type definition, they will be used and explained later: private boIconAdded : Boolean; icoIcon : tIcon; nidIconData : TNotifyIconData; The components used by this example application look like the following: Their entries in the main form's type definition are as follows: TForm1 = class(TForm) BitBtn1: TBitBtn; BitBtn2: TBitBtn; BitBtn3: TBitBtn; Button1: TButton; Button2: TButton; Button3: TButton; Button4: TButton; ComboBox1: TComboBox; Edit1: TEdit; Edit2: TEdit; Exit1: TMenuItem; GroupBox1: TGroupBox; GroupBox2: TGroupBox; GroupBox3: TGroupBox; GroupBox4: TGroupBox; Icon11: TMenuItem; Icon21: TMenuItem; Label1: TLabel; Label2: TLabel; Label3: TLabel; Label4: TLabel; Memo1: TMemo; Memo2: TMemo; N1: TMenuItem; OpenDialog1: TOpenDialog; PopupMenu1: TPopupMenu; SpinEdit1: TSpinEdit; Note that what you have in your user interface has no bearing on the icons in the taskbar notification area. Make your application look however you want. The first button is used to make the icon appear in the taskbar notification area: procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject); begin if ( not boIconAdded ) then begin FillChar(nidIconData,SizeOf(nidIconData),0); nidIconData.cbSize := sizeof(nidIconData); nidIconData.Wnd := self.Handle; nidIconData.uCallbackMessage := wm_IconMessages; nidIconData.uID := 1; nidIconData.hIcon := Application.Icon.Handle; nidIconData.uFlags := NIF_MESSAGE + NIF_ICON; if ( Shell_NotifyIcon(NIM_ADD, @nidIconData) ) then begin boIconAdded := True; Memo2.Lines.Add('Icon added.'); end; end; end; The first thing to do is check that the icon is not already in the taskbar notification area, otherwise there is nothing to do. Fill the NotifyIconData structure with zeroes to ensure that nothing unexpected happens because of uninitialized data. The cbSize member has two purposes. Firstly it lets the operating system know the size of the structure and secondly it tells the operating system what version of the structure you're using. The operating system knows the relationship between the size and the version of the structure. We are insterested in the minimum version that allows us to use balloon ToolTips. The references provided at the end of this article will tell you how to program for different versions of the operating system which support different functionality. The Wnd member is the handle of the window that receives messages from the operating system relating to the icon in the taskbar notification area. The uCallbackMessage member is the message identifier that the operating system will send to the above window. This is the constant specified in the constants section of the main form's unit. The uID member is an arbitrary number used to identify which icon you want to act on. This provides a single application with the ability to have more than one icon in the taskbar notification area. If you make use of this feature, be sure to use a different uCallbackMessage for each icon, otherwise you will not know which icon caused the message to be sent. The uID member is only used in calls you make to the operating system, not in messages you receive from the operating system. The hIcon member requires a handle to an existing icon that will be used to display in the taskbar notification area. Here we are using the application's main icon as the initial icon. Other methods of using icons will be shown later. Different operating systems support icons with different color depths. Read the references carefully to understand the limitations. The uFlags member tells the operating system what parts of the structure contain data to be used. You can perform multiple tasks with one call, but some calls are mutually exclusive. Read the references carefully. In this example, when the icon is added to the taskbar notification area, we're telling the operating system with NIF_MESSAGE that the Wnd, uCallbackMessage and uID members have data, and with NIF_ICON that the hIcon member has data. The order in which you fill the structure is not important. The entire structure is sent to the operating system with the Shell_NotifyIcon API call. The NIM_ADD value tells the operating system that this is a new icon to be added to the taskbar notification area. The example application uses the boIconAdded variable to keep track of whether or not the icon is in the taskbar notification area. The Memo2 memo is used to display what actions are taken by the example application. The second button is used to delete the icon from the taskbar notification area: procedure TForm1.Button2Click(Sender: TObject); begin if ( boIconAdded ) then begin nidIconData.uFlags := 0; if ( Shell_NotifyIcon(NIM_DELETE, @nidIconData) ) then begin boIconAdded := False; Memo2.Lines.Add('Icon deleted.'); end; end; end; The first thing to do is check that there is an icon in the taskbar notification area to delete, otherwise there is nothing to do. The Wnd and uID members of the structure already contain the values necessary to identify which icon to delete. If you added more than one icon then you would need to use the uID member to specify which icon you want to delete. Note that the icon is only deleted from the taskbar notification area. The icon will still be in application memory. The first two bitmap buttons are used to change the icon in the taskbar notification area using icons in the application's resources. To get the icons in the resource is beyond the scope of this article, but simply put, I created two icons and used Delphi's Borland Resource Compiler to create the resource file. I included the necessary files in the example project, including a batch file used to create the resource file. I also saved each icon as a bitmap to use on the bitmap buttons. The OnClick events of the two bitmap buttons are as follows: procedure TForm1.BitBtn1Click(Sender: TObject); begin if ( boIconAdded ) then begin nidIconData.uFlags := NIF_ICON; nidIconData.hIcon := LoadIcon(hInstance, 'Icon1'); if ( Shell_NotifyIcon(NIM_MODIFY, @nidIconData) ) then Memo2.Lines.Add('Changed to icon 1.') else Memo2.Lines.Add('Failed to change to icon 1.'); end; end; procedure TForm1.BitBtn2Click(Sender: TObject); begin if ( boIconAdded ) then begin nidIconData.uFlags := NIF_ICON; nidIconData.hIcon := LoadIcon(hInstance, 'Icon2'); if ( Shell_NotifyIcon(NIM_MODIFY, @nidIconData) ) then Memo2.Lines.Add('Changed to icon 2.') else Memo2.Lines.Add('Failed to change to icon 2.'); end; end; The uFlags member is set to tell the operating system that we're changing the icon used in the taskbar notification area. The hIcon member is set to the handle of an icon loaded from the application's recources. The example application does not check for errors, but you should. The third bitmap button uses the standard TOpenDialog to let you choose an icon file from disk. After dropping the TOpenDialog component on the form I set its DefaultExt property to "ico", its Filter peoperty to "Icon files (*.ico)|*.ico" and its FilterIndex to "1". I also set ofFileMustExist to "True" in its Options. The OnClick event handler is as follows: procedure TForm1.BitBtn3Click(Sender: TObject); begin if ( icoIcon = nil ) then icoIcon := tIcon.Create; if ( boIconAdded ) then if ( OpenDialog1.Execute ) then begin icoIcon.LoadFromFile(OpenDialog1.FileName); nidIconData.uFlags := NIF_ICON; nidIconData.hIcon := icoIcon.Handle; if ( Shell_NotifyIcon(NIM_MODIFY, @nidIconData) ) then Memo2.Lines.Add('Changed to icon "'+OpenDialog1.FileName+'".') else Memo2.Lines.Add('Failed to change to icon "'+OpenDialog1.FileName+'".'); end; end; If the icoIcon object, defined in the private section of the main form's type definition, does not exist then it needs to be created. Once created it can be re-used as many times as needed. Alternatively, you could create it explicitly in the main form's OnCreate event handler. It depends entirely on the complexity of your application. In this simple application, this is the only place the object gets used. Other than loading the icon from a file on disk, the rest is the same as above. Type some text into the Edit1 edit control and click the "Set tip" button: procedure TForm1.Button3Click(Sender: TObject); begin if ( boIconAdded ) then begin StrPLCopy(nidIconData.szTip, Edit1.Text, 127); nidIconData.uFlags := NIF_TIP; if ( Shell_NotifyIcon(NIM_MODIFY, @nidIconData) ) then Memo2.Lines.Add('Tip changed.') else Memo2.Lines.Add('Failed to change tip.'); end; end; The uFlags member is set to tell the operaing system that we want to change the ToolTip that appears over the icon when the mouse cursor hovers over it in the taskbar notification area. You can include the carriage return and line feed characters to produce a multiline ToolTip in later versions of the operating system, but for simplicity I have used a single line edit control for the ToolTip. See the balloon ToolTip for a multi-line example. In this version of the NotifyIconData structure, the szTip member is 128 bytes in size, which includes the null terminator. I set the MaxLength property of the Edit1 edit control to "127", but I still use StrPLCopy to create a null terminated string that is guaranteed not to overrun the buffer. To pop up a balloon ToolTip four pieces of information are required. The ComboBox1, Edit2, Memo1 and SpinEdit1 controls let you choose what to put in the NotifyIconData structure to get the balloon ToolTip that you want. The Combobox1 control has four Items set at design time: "None", "Info", "Warning" and "Error". In earlier versions of Delphi the Combobox1's ItemIndex property must be set programmatically, otherwise no item will be selected at run time which is undesirable. In later versions of Delphi the ItemIndex property is conveniently available at design timeand I set it to "0". The Style property is set to csDropDownList so that only one of the four existing items can be selected. Click the "Send balloon tip" button to send the data to the operating system: procedure TForm1.Button4Click(Sender: TObject); begin if ( boIconAdded ) then begin StrPLCopy(nidIconData.szInfo, Memo1.Text, 255); StrPLCopy(nidIconData.szInfoTitle, Edit2.Text, 63); nidIconData.dwInfoFlags := ComboBox1.ItemIndex; nidIconData.uTimeout := SpinEdit1.Value * 1000; nidIconData.uFlags := NIF_INFO; if ( Shell_NotifyIcon(NIM_MODIFY, @nidIconData) ) then Memo2.Lines.Add('Balloon tip sent.') else Memo2.Lines.Add('Failed to send balloon tip.'); end; end; The szInfo member gets the text from the memo control which can have multiple lines,however it is limited to 256 bytes, including the null terminator. The memo's MaxLength property is set to "255", but I still use StrPLCopy to create a null terminated string that is guaranteed not to overrun the buffer. The szInfo member can be an empty string (just the null terminator) to programmatically remove a currently displaying balloon ToolTip that was created by your application. If there is a balloon ToolTip currently being displayed that was created by your application then it will be immediately replaced with the new one. The szInfoTitle member is optional with the caveat that if it is an empty string then there will be no icon on the top left of the balloon ToolTip, even if you specify one. The edit2 contol's MaxLength property is set to "63", but I still use StrPLCopy to create a null terminated string that is guaranteed not to overrun the buffer. If you provide a title in the szInfoTitle member then you can use the dwinfoFlags member to specify an icon that appears to the left of the title. The legal values for dwinfoFlags start at 1000, so that is added to the Combobox1's ItemIndex property value to get what we want. The uTimeout member takes a value between 10,000 and 30,000 which represent milliseconds (thousandths of a second), hence the "* 1000" in the code. If you use a value outside that range then the operating system will use the nearest legal value. The timeout is not well documented making it appear to behave inconsistently. Suffice it to say, do not rely on the timeout for functionality. Set the uFlags member to NIF_INFO to tell the operating system to use the four members discussed above. Note that only one balloon ToolTip can be displayed in the taskbar notification area for all applications. Your balloon may not appear immediately. This is discussed in more detail later. The operating system notifies your application about activities dealing with your taskbar notification area icon using the callback defined in the protected section of your main form as described above. Here is the callback procedure: procedure TForm1.wmIconMessages(var Msg: tMessage); var ptPosition : TPoint; begin case Msg.lParam of NIN_BALLOONSHOW: Memo2.Lines.Add('Received NIN_BALLOONSHOW.'); NIN_BALLOONHIDE: Memo2.Lines.Add('Received NIN_BALLOONHIDE.'); NIN_BALLOONTIMEOUT: Memo2.Lines.Add('Received NIN_BALLOONTIMEOUT.'); NIN_BALLOONUSERCLICK: Memo2.Lines.Add('Received NIN_BALLOONUSERCLICK.'); WM_LBUTTONUP: begin Application.BringToFront; Memo2.Lines.Add('Received WM_LBUTTONUP.'); end; WM_RBUTTONUP: begin Memo2.Lines.Add('Received WM_RBUTTONUP.'); GetCursorPos(ptPosition); PopupMenu1.Popup(ptPosition.x, ptPosition.y); end; end; end; The value of the message's lParam parameter tells you what the message is about. Read the references below for all possible values, the ones used in this example application are for demonstration only. As mentioned above, only one balloon ToolTip can be displayed at a time. If you send a balloon ToolTip, it may have to wait for another application's balloon ToolTip to disappear. Your application is notified with NIN_BALLOONSHOW when your balloon ToolTip is actually displayed. If you send another balloon ToolTip before the previous one created by your application has disappeared then it will be immediately replaced by the new one. If you delete the icon from the taskbar notification area while a balloon ToolTip created by your application is being displayed, your application will receive NIN_BALLOONHIDE. If you send a balloon ToolTip with an empty szInfo member while a balloon ToolTip created by your application is being displayed, your application will receive NIN_BALLOONHIDE. Your application will receive NIN_BALLOONTIMEOUT for a number of reasons: If the balloon ToolTip times out, if your application sends another balloon ToolTip while a previous one is being displayed, if another application sends a balloon ToolTip while one created by your application is being displayed, if the user clicks on the dismiss button in the top, right of the balloon ToolTip. Your application will receive NIN_BALLOONUSERCLICK if the user clicks on the balloon ToolTip's message or the icon itself. Your application will receive WM_LBUTTONDOWN and WM_LBUTTONUP if the user uses the mouse's primary button to click on the icon. In this example application I respond by bringing the application to the front. Your application will receive WM_RBUTTONDOWN and WM_RBUTTONUP if the user uses the mouse's secondary button to click on the icon. In this example application I pop up a simple menu with three items created at design time. The first two pop-up menu items are bound to the OnClick event handlers of the first two bitmap buttons, effectively changing the icon as if one of the buttons was clicked. The third pop-up menu item's OnClick event handler simply shuts down the application as follows: procedure TForm1.Exit1Click(Sender: TObject); begin Close; end; To get a feel for what the example application does, try the following while paying attention to the "Activity History" memo control: *Click on the "Add Icon" button. **Click on each of the "Icon" buttons and note how the icon changes immediately, even if there is a balloon ToolTip being displayed. **Put text in the balloon tool tip memo control. Click on the "Send balloon tip" button. When the balloon is displayed, change the text and click on the button again. Note that the balloon changes immediately. **Remove the text from the balloon tool tip "Title" control. Click on the "Send balloon tip" button. Note that there is no icon in the top, left of the balloon, even if you choose one from the combobox. Note also that there is no dismiss button in the top, right of the balloon. **Send a balloon ToolTip with text in the memo control. Right-click on the memo control and select "Select All" from the pop-up menu and press the "Delete" key on your keyboard. Click on the "Send balloon tip" button. Note how the balloon disappears immediately and that the application receives NIN_BALLOONHIDE. **Switch to another application and left-click on the icon in the taskbar notification area. Note how the application reappears, because we specifically programmed it to behave that way. Your application can also handle situations where the application is minimized or even hidden. **Right-click on the icon in the taskbar notification area and try each of the pop-up menu items. Note how they do what we programmed them to do. *Launch two instances of the application and add an icon for each one. Change their icons so that you can tell them apart. **Put text in the balloon tool tip memo control of both applications, then click on each of their "Send balloon tip" buttons. Note that only the first application's balloon is displayed. **Click on the balloon's dismiss button and wait. Note how the second application's balloon is now displayed and the second application now receives NIN_BALLOONSHOW. *See if you can figure out the timeout functionality through trial and error. Good luck! References *Shell_NotifyIcon Function *NOTIFYICONDATA Structure *Using ToolTip Controls *System Tray Balloon Tips and Freeing Resources Quickly Category:Examples